9/11 Tightening the Noose: The IAEA Report on Iran’s Nuclear Program…..Britain’s armed forces have reportedly stepped up contingency planning for potential military action against Iran (3)

A joint statement by the Campaign Against Sanctions & Military Intervention in Iran (CASMII)
and The Virginia Defender newspaper, USA

Monday, November 7, 2011

A diplomatic, economic and military noose is being steadily tightened around the Islamic Republic of Iran.

On the diplomatic front, the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is about to release its latest report on Iran’s nuclear program, a program Iran insists is solely designed to produce electricity and not atomic or nuclear weapons, as is claimed by the United States and other Western powers.

According to a Nov. 6 story by the Reuters news agency, the report is tentatively scheduled to be submitted to IAEA member states on Nov. 9. That report “is expected to give fresh evidence of research and other activities with little other application than atomic bomb-making, including studies linked to the development of an atom bomb trigger and computer modeling of a nuclear weapon.” (1)

Such “evidence” would give the U.S. ammunition to pressure the U.N Security Council to impose a fifth round of economic sanctions against Iran, or even help justify a military attack by Israel, the United States, the United Kingdom or all three countries, all of which have developed contingency plans for just such an attack.

Tightening the noose

The IAEA report comes amid a background of other ominous developments:

– Beginning in late October, Israeli media began widely speculating that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was heavily lobbying for military strikes against Iran’s nuclear sites.

– On Nov. 2, Israel test-fired a missile said to be capable of carrying a nuclear warhead and reaching Iranian territory. (2)

– These developments follow widely challenged U.S. allegations of an Iranian plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States, an attack that top U.S. officials claim was to be carried out by a hit-man hired from the Mexican Zeta drug cartel, an outfit known to be heavily infiltrated by U.S. anti-drug agents. (4)

– Meanwhile, the Pentagon is hard at work strengthening its military alliance with the Persian Gulf states that, together with U.S.-occupied Iraq and Afghanistan, form a military semi-circle around the Islamic Republic.

– The U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee is considering a new sanctions bill that would, for the first time in U.S. history, forbid the president or any member of his administration to talk with a representative of another country, in this case Iran, without prior Congressional approval, effectively blocking any chance of a negotiated settlement of differences between the U.S. and Iran. The bill is being heavily promoted by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), Israel’s well-funded U.S. lobbying organization. (5)

For its part, Iran is insisting that any “proof” the IAEA will release claiming to show evidence of a nuclear weapons program will be nothing more than rehashed fabricated charges. On Nov. 5, Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi stated that Iran had already provided a 117-page response to such allegations and that the IAEA report will add nothing new to those false claims.

As the U.S. government ratchets up these diplomatic, economic and military pressures, let’s review Iran’s international rights and responsibilities concerning its nuclear program.

The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty

First of all, the only reason the IAEA is issuing this report in the first place is that Iran is one of the 189 countries that have signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the world’s principal arms control agreement. Only three U.N. members have never signed the treaty: Israel, which constantly accuses Iran of violating the NPT; India, which nevertheless is part of the U.N.’s IAEA team charged with making sure that countries signing the NPT adhere to its rules; and Pakistan, which with its failed government presents a real threat of the actual use of nuclear weapons.

WMD charges all over again, and with the same goal

We already know without a doubt that the U.S. government will lie in order to build a case for war. That’s exactly what it did in 2003 with its charges against Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, ties to al-Qaeda and responsibility for the 9/11 attacks.

As with Iraq, the real aim for Iran is a regime change in order to set up a puppet government in this oil- and gas-rich country in the strategically key Persian Gulf region.

Iran has an internationally recognized right to develop nuclear energy

As a signatory to the NPT, Iran has an “inalienable right” to develop and use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. Further, the NPT actually requires all parties to the treaty to help other members wishing to develop nuclear technology for peaceful purposes. But with Western pressure blocking its access to such cooperation, Iran has been forced to strive for self-reliance in nuclear technology.

Despite a campaign of continuing and multiple charges, the fact is that there is no credible evidence that Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons. Every IAEA report on Iran to date, including that of May 31, 2010, has stated that “the Agency continues to verify the non-diversion of declared nuclear material in Iran.”(6)

Further, the 2011 National Intelligence Estimate on Iran reportedly once again states that there is no evidence that Iran is working to develop an atomic or nuclear weapon. The NIE is the collective report of the 16 U.S. intelligence agencies. (7)

In his latest article for The New Yorker magazine in June 2011, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh says the United States might attack Iran based on distorted estimates of Iran’s nuclear and military threat — just like it did with Saddam Hussein’s government in Iraq. Hersh, who has access to internal sources of the U.S. Administration, reveals that despite, using Iranian informants and cutting-edge surveillance technology, U.S. officials have been unable to find decisive evidence that Iran has been moving enriched uranium to an underground weapons-making center.

All enriched uranium is not the same

It is true that nuclear power plants, medical reactors and atomic or nuclear weapons all require enriched uranium. But while power plants require “low-enriched uranium” (LEU, uranium enriched up to 5 percent), and Iran’s lone medical reactor needs uranium enriched up to 19.75 percent, nuclear weapons require uranium enriched to a very high degree, above 90 percent. The process of producing this very highly enriched uranium is much more difficult and complex than that used for the lower enriched uranium. And yet, despite being the most inspected country in the world, there has never been any evidence that Iran has developed or is using this higher enrichment process. Even so, Washington demands that Iran terminate its enrichment process altogether, in essence denying Iran its inalienable right to pursue civilian nuclear technology under the NPT.

In an exact replica of the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, the U.S. now alleges that Iran has engaged in “nuclear weaponization studies” and claims it has documents that prove its charge – documents it says it has had for some time but which it has refused to provide to the IAEA.

Iran’s need for nuclear energy and technology is real

In the past three decades, Iran’s population has more than doubled, while its per capita energy consumption has grown at an even faster rate. Demand has so outpaced production that electricity is now rationed. The country needs to diversify its energy sources in order to keep up with demand and still have enough oil and gas both for export and for future generations. It is in Iran’s legitimate security interest to develop alternatives to oil for domestic consumption.

There is no legal basis for U.N. sanctions against Iran

Despite all this, the United Nations Security Council has imposed four rounds of economic sanctions against Iran, a result of the IAEA’s having referred Iran’s “nuclear file” to the UNSC. But the only legal justification for referring the file would be if Iran had violated the provisions of the NPT, which the IAEA has never proven. In fact, referring Iran’s file to the UNSC, thus opening the door to the UNSC imposing sanctions, was the result of intense political pressure by the U.S. and its allies. Therefore, the UNSC’s imposition of sanctions on Iran violates the IAEA’s own statutes and lacks legitimacy.

If the U.S. charges against Iran are not purely political, then why does the U.S. defend Israel’s open-secret “nuclear deterrence”? Why is it that in 2009 U.S. ally South Korea and Egypt, at the time also a close ally, were not punished after revelations that they had experimented with near-weapons-grade nuclear material?

Iran is not a threat

In order to justify depriving Iran of nuclear technology, many U.S. political figures portray the Iranian leadership as irrational and hell-bent on using nuclear weapons as soon as they could develop them. But Iran has not attacked any other country in more than 200 years. Its per capita military spending is among the lowest in its region. On the contrary, it is Iran that has been attacked on many occasions, including the 1980 U.S.-backed Iraqi invasion that led to eight years of full-scale war at the cost of hundreds of thousands of Iranian lives.

Further, the U.S. and Israel both have vastly superior military capabilities, including massive nuclear arsenals. The U.S. maintains military bases in most of the countries around Iran. It has a constant naval presence off the southern coast of Iran, threatening Iran with military attack.

Iran is under constant threat of illegal foreign intervention

All leading U.S. politicians, including President Obama, have stated that, in dealing with Iran, “all options are on the table.” President Obama’s Nuclear Posture Review singles out only one non-nuclear armed country, namely Iran, as a possible target for U.S. nuclear attack. Israeli officials also have threatened to launch war on Iran, threats that are now intensifying.

All this is in violation of Article 2 of the U.N. Charter, which forbids member countries from threatening or using force against other countries.

The stated goal of what are now four sets of Security Council-imposed sanctions, as well as unilateral sanctions imposed by the U.S. and many European countries, is to pressure Iran to abandon its nuclear program.

In reality, the sanctions are meant to promote “regime change” in Iran.

What is really behind the anti-Iran campaign?

So if Iran does not present a threat to its neighbors, the U.S. or to the world as a whole, why is the U.S. government so fixated on it?

Could it be because Iran, with the world’s third largest known oil reserves, refuses to allow itself to be recolonized by the West or to allow the U.S. to gain hegemony in the oil-rich and strategically critical Middle East?

A peaceful resolution of this intensifying conflict can only be achieved by rejecting the current illegitimate course of threats and sanctions. The U.S. policy of aggression must be replaced with unconditional and comprehensive negotiations between Iran and the U.S., based on mutual respect, to build trust between the two sides and find a solution to the stand-off that recognizes Iran’s sovereignty and national rights.

(7) “Iran and the Bomb: How real is the nuclear threat?” by Seymour M. Hersh, The New Yorker, June 6, 2011

SOURCES:

The Campaign Against Sanctions & Military Intervention in Iran (CASMI ) is an independent campaign organisation with the purpose of opposing sanctions, foreign state interference and military intervention in Iran. For more information, visit http://www.casmii.org

The Virginia Defender is a statewide community newspaper published quarterly by the Defenders for Freedom, Justice & Equality in Richmond, Virginia, USA. For more information, visit http://www.DefendersFJE.org.

ZOG OF BRITAIN SACRIFICING MORE BRITISH LIVES FOR THE FOREIGN STATE OF ISRAEL- IRAQ-AFGHANISTAN- LIBYA- NOW IRAN- A GREATER FASCIST ISRAEL AIDED BY ZIONIST BRITAIN AND PUBLIC APATHY!

WW3 FOR ISRAEL?

Brian
November 9, 2011 – 1:59 pm
For what it’s worth:

Nuclear Wikileaks: Cables Show Cosy US Relationship with IAEA Chief

From the article:

2. (C) In a meeting with Ambassador on the eve of the two-week Board of Governors (BoG) and General Conference (GC) marathon of mid-September, IAEA Director General-designate Yukiya Amano thanked the U.S. for having supported his candidacy and took pains to emphasize his support for U.S. strategic objectives for the Agency. Amano reminded Ambassador on several occasions that he would need to make concessions to the G-77, which correctly required him to be fair-minded and independent, but that he was solidly in the U.S. court on every key strategic decision, from high-level personnel appointments to the handling of Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program.

Brian: Can we believe Amano when it comes to Iran and nuclear weapons?

The latest batch of WikiLeaks revelations give the impression that it is the Arab states that are most energetically pressuring the US to attack Iran. That’s definitely putting the cart before the horse.

In the first place, the Arab governments mentioned as being hostile to Iran – Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain, Abu Dhabi and the United Arab Emirates – are all undemocratic, unpopular regimes that depend on US support to stay in power. As such, they seem to have absorbed the US claims that Iran is the region’s greatest threat to peace.

A completely different view, however, is held by these governments’ own subjects, among whom Iran’s independent stance is hugely popular. According to a recent poll that asked Arab people in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco and the United Arab Emirates to name two countries they thought were the greatest threat to the region, 88% stated Israel, 77% stated the US and only 10% mentioned Iran.

Of course, no Arab country has the military capability of launching a serious attack against Iran. Only Israel has that ability in the region, but Israel is dependent for its continued existence on its $3bn in annual US subsidies and its US-supplied diplomatic firewall in the UN security council. There is almost no way Israel could attack Iran unless it had first been given a green light from Washington or because it had calculated the US would have no choice but to back it up with military force.

Without a doubt, Iran does represent a threat to US imperial interests. Iran takes no orders from Washington, its natural resources are off-limits to Western corporations and it has no love for the corrupt, pro-Western governments that dominate the region. As such, it represents an obstacle to US hegemony.

To demonise Iran, the US has for eight years promoted the myth of an Iranian nuclear weapons programme, much as it demonised Iraq through its false charges about weapons of mass destruction. And while this myth has formed the basis for four sets of UN sanctions against Iran, the US has never provided the first shred of proof and its “evidence” of Iran’s nuclear weapons studies has now been shown to be simply a fabrication.

No, the principal threat to Iran remains the United States, which for years, prodded by nuclear-armed Israel, has declared that “all options are on the table.”

On 5 December, Iran is scheduled to begin revived negotiations with the five permanent UN security council members, plus Germany. This would be an ideal time for Washington to make the following declaration: that it will not attack Iran, will not allow an attack by Israel, will end all sanctions against Iran, will recognise Iran’s right under the UN’s Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to pursue peaceful nuclear power, will return Iran’s nuclear file from the UN Security Council to the IAEA in exchange for Iran’s stated pledge to allow the intrusive inspections of the IAEA’s Additional Protocol and will agree to discuss all outstanding differences in a spirit of mutual respect.

• Abbas Edalat is founder of the Campaign Against Sanctions & Military Intervention in Iran [CASMI] Phil Wilayto is an anti-war activist and author of In Defence of Iran: Notes from a US Peace Delegation’s Journey through the Islamic Republic

TALMUDIC GOVERNMENTS ACROSS THE MIDDLE EAST WILL/ARE BE PUT IN PLACE BY WARS…..From the book written by Douglas Reed- The Controversy of Zion………………….three years in the writing..after ww2.

GREATEST THREAT TO WORLD PEACE – NO DOUBT WHATSOEVER IS ISRAEL!

FANATICS IN CHARGE TAKING US ALL TO HELL!

ZIONISM OUT OF BRITISH POLITICS- BUGGER OFF TO ISRAEL THOSE THAT WANT TO WORK FOR ZIONISTS!

One response to “9/11 Tightening the Noose: The IAEA Report on Iran’s Nuclear Program…..Britain’s armed forces have reportedly stepped up contingency planning for potential military action against Iran (3)”

Such words as “conspiracy” and “intrigue”, often used in this narrative, are not original with me; they come from authoritative sources. Mr. Arthur D. Howden, who wrote his biography in consultation with the man depicted, supplies the chapter title above; he describes the process of which Mr. House was (in America) the centre during the 1914-1918 war in the words, “a web of intrigue was spun across the Atlantic”.

In England the Lloyd George government and in America the president were at first separately enmeshed. Between 1914 and 1917 these “webs” in London and Washington were joined together by the transoceanic threads which Mr. Howden depicts in the spinning. Thereafter the two governments were caught in the same web and have never since freed themselves from it.

In President Wilson’s America the real president was Mr. House (“liaison officer between the Wilson administration and the Zionist movement”, Rabbi Wise). Mr. Justice Brandeis, who had decided to “give his life” to Zionism, was the president’s “adviser on the Jewish question” (Dr. Weizmann); this is the first appearance in the Presidential household of an authority theretofore unknown in it and now apparently permanent. The chief Zionist organizer was Rabbi Wise, constantly in touch with the two other men.

From this period in 1916-1917 the decay of parliamentary and representative government can be traced, both in England and America. If secret men could dictate major acts of American state policy and major operations of British armies, then clearly “e1ection” and “responsible office” were terms devoid of meaning. Party distinctions began to fade in both countries, once this hidden, supreme authority was accepted by leading Western politicians, and the American and British electors began to be deprived of all true choice. Today this condition is general, and now is public. Leaders of all parties, before elections, make obeisance to Zionism, and the voter’s se1ection of president, prime minister or party makes no true difference.

In November 1917 the American Republic thus became equally involved with Great Britain in Zionism, which has proved to be a destructive force. However, it was only one agency of “the destructive principle”. The reader will recall that in Dr. Weizmann’s Russian youth the mass of Jews there, under their Talmudic directors, were united in the revolutionary aim, and only divided between revolutionary-Zionism and revolutionary-Communism.

In the very week of the Balfour Dec1aration the other group of Jews in Russia

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achieved their aim, the destruction of the Russian nation-state. The Western po1iticians thus bred a bicephalous monster, one head being the power of Zionism in the Western capitals, and the other the power of Communism advancing from captive Russia. Submission to Zionism weakened the power of the West to preserve itself against the world-revolution, for Zionism worked to keep Western governments submissive and to deflect their po1icies from national interests; indeed, at that instant the cry was first raised that opposition to the world-revo1ution, too, was “anti-semitism”. Governments hampered by secret capitulations in any one direction cannot act firmly in any other, and the timidity of London and Washington in their dea1ings with the world-revolution, during the four decades to follow, evident1y derived from their initial submission to “the web of intrigue” spun across the Atlantic between 1914 and 1917.

After 1917, therefore, the question which the remainder of the 20th Century had to answer was whether the West could yet find in itself the strength to break free, or prise its po1itical 1eaders 1oose, from this double thrall. In considering the remainder of this account the reader should bear in mind what British and American politicians were induced to do during the First World War.